• Vaping and Smoking Areas at Workplaces
    We are fully smoke/vape free at all depots, external worksites and in company vehicles. Staff at external worksites are required to leave the worksite and remove branded clothing before smoking. Staff at the depot I'm at generally go and stand under a tree outside the back gate. The numbers of staff who do smoke have been steadily reducing over the years
  • Women and the working environment
    The number of women in our industry is growing but is still very much the minority - we are working on it
  • Vehicle Inductions
    After a number of minor incidents with our heavier vehicles, we recognised that new drivers were featuring more often than not. We now have additional supervision for new class 2 drivers - "Off road class 2 drivers – qualified drivers with less than 6 months experience must be supervised by a class 2 driver with minimum 2 years off road driving experience"
  • Women and the working environment
    We've put work into getting PPE that fits our female staff but finding harnesses for working at heights that both fit our female workers and meet the safety requirements of our industry has been difficult.
  • Should risk registers be signed off by workers?
    We involve our workers in the development of the risk registers, usually via the HSRs but sometimes via working groups. Our risk review process also includes the HSRs
  • ISO 45001 Standard Document
    Our standards licencing restricts us from sharing but if you have access to university libraries you can usually access there
  • Health & Wellbeing Allowances
    In addition to an onsite gym, we have a $200 (gst incl) allowance every year for wellness. Wellness extends to house insulation, sportswear, chiropractors etc. Equipment for hunting allows clothing and hiking/camping equipment but not firearms.
  • Oh no - I've Had The Dreaded Worksafe Call.
    Let them know any PPE requirements for your site in advance and prepare to induct them to the site when they get there
  • Safety Shoes
    We have a combination of field staff and office staff who may visit sites occasionally. The office staff are given a purchase order to go down to Blackwoods to choose a pair. The field staff are different in that their boots need to be electrically rated and tested so they generally get 2 pairs per year so one pair will always be in test. They will also be given gumboots (standard or dielectric) depending on their role.

    As far as I am aware noone is asked to pay for boots if they leave early and boots are kept
  • Mask wearing for COVID at expense of other risks
    There are some solutions for glasses fogging up, including making sure it fits snuggly around the nose, wearing your glasses slightly further down or using an anti-fog lens wipe.

    Our workers are expected to wear a mask if working within 1m of one another and safety glasses are usually mandatory for them although exceptions can be made (if approved by the supervisor and dfor specific tasks only)
  • Board Reporting

    Thank you

    We haven't added stories before so that's definitely something to consider
  • Board Reporting

    It will be interesting to see how you get on
  • Board Reporting

    Hi Jane

    my email is

    Thanks heaps

    Alex
  • Telarc Audits - Re-write your SMS to follow ISO 450001 format
    We've had contractors submit their HSMS manual for pre-qualification purposes in the past and have had a couple written to match the old ACC WSMP headings. It was clear that the manual had been written to meet audit requirements and not necessarily the business needs so the questions was raised as to whether or not it was actually followed.
  • "Digital" OHSMIS - Occupational Health & Safety Systems used by companies in NZ?
    We use Vault but with the Business Intelligence add-on, Notify and Check apps and are starting to integrate Bracken training. The default reporting in Vault is really bad so the Business Intelligence lets us get the info we actually need
  • Hard hat life
    As we use two different types of hard hats - one for ground based and one that is required for working at heights we colour code to easily differentiate; we want to know quickly if someone has an incorrect hardhat when working at heights.

    The coloured ground based hats used by both field staff and office visitors are deemed to have a 2 year life and we change the colour at the end of each 2 years. While those allocated to office based staff don't see as much work it is much simpler to change them all at the same time so we know that they are current without having to check individual hats regularly
  • Fatigue Management Policy
    I'm working in an industry when long hours and call outs may be required. We generally work under the NZTA guidelines for all workers not just the class 2 and above drivers.

    Our basic rules are no more than 13 hours work but up to a 16 hour day for emergency work. A formal stand-down is required after so many hours or after an early morning call out.
  • Book recommendations for developing health and safety knowledge
    I can't remember the exact titles but the books Todd Conklin has written are a great view of Safety and Risk management
  • Insecure load = fall from height
    We work a lot on whether or not someone was in the drop zone - or will dropping a conductor affect public safety

    We don't generally consider items falling from trucks as notifiable falling from height
  • LTI severity rating
    We have our LTIs split - those arising from critical risks and others. The others are generally minor strains/sprains while we have 10 critical risks identified for the company. The annual targets have also been set base on this - 0 from critical risks and <6 for others to recognise that we can't always prevent, for example, a rolled ankle that results in time off